


secrets and lies

by sunnywolff



Category: Marvel, The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Betrayal, F/M, Minor Violence, Presumed Dead, Protective Frank Castle, Reader-Insert, Threats of Violence, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-16
Updated: 2020-05-16
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:00:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24214813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunnywolff/pseuds/sunnywolff
Summary: the one where you find out that your best friend is alive, your fiancé is one of the few that knew and also set up the hit on your family. now, you must decide who you trust is telling the truth and come face to face with all the dirty secrets that have been hidden.
Relationships: Billy Russo/Reader
Kudos: 14
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	secrets and lies

“I need you to stop talking. You’re supposed to be dead.”

You stare disbelievingly at the man who showed up on your doorstep out of nowhere and is still talking like you never said a word. It’s a man you once knew very well. A man you grew up with and watched get buried next to his family. A man who is currently covered in blood, head to toe. While his face is bruised to all hell, like he willingly became someone’s personal punching bag. A man who is very clearly _still_ alive. Your oldest and only cousin the King was standing in your kitchen like you guys do this every single week.

And the only thing he’s talking about how your fiancé isn’t who he says he is, how dangerous he is and that you are in serious danger.

“Please stop talking.” You try interrupting him again because you have no idea what the actual hell he is talking about. But like the stubborn ass he is, he just ignores you again.

“Francis, can you shut up for one second?!” Once he goes quiet, you take a much-needed deep breath and raise your hand toward his face. “Frankie, you’re alive. How are y—how is that possible? Where have you been?”

Frank walks up to you and pulls you in to his arms, squeezing you tightly. “I’m sorry kid. I know this must be a lot, but I need you to buck up and listen, yeah? I’ll explain everything later but right now I gotta keep the Princess safe.”

Holding your breath, you just leave your arms down at your sides. Not returning his hug at all because of that name.

That stupid nickname from when you were kids was confusing you, it was only used when things were extremely serious, or danger was around the corner. You had only heard it twice and both of those times were for very good reasons. The first time was when your dad was injured in his last tour over seas and Frank had come home to be the one to tell you. _“Princess, I’m so sorry. Uncle, your dad, he is not coming home the same person that he left. He got hurt, real bad.”_ The second time was when his wife and kids were killed, and he knew someone was going after everyone close to him. _“You need to get to the safe house now, Princess! I’ll explain later but I really need you to stay put until it’s safe.”_

So, the fact that he is using that name, now, means something is very wrong and you finally hug him back.

You nod and stand straighter, clenching your jaw for a second. “Okay, marine. But don’t think you’re going to get out of this without explaining how you aren’t in the casket we- the casket _I_ buried you in.” You try to fight the smile that happens when your cousin pulls away from the hug and takes the invisible crown off his head just to place it on yours.

“Wouldn’t think of it, princess. Now, like I was trying to tell you _before_ you so rudely interrupted me – about Russo – you may want to sit down for this. It’s going to be a lot to take in.” With a single nod from you, Frank leads you over to the couch and sits on the coffee table in front of you.

A look settled over his face. It was a look that made your heart stop because it usually meant that someone died. The very last time you saw that look on him was when you were nine and Frank was the one to tell you that your mom was killed in a hit and run accident and you had to go live with him and his parents now.

Frank watched you for a couple minutes. Searching for something or just trying to find the right words to speak, you weren’t sure but whatever it was he must have figured it out.

In the next moment he is squeezing your hands once more before locking eyes with you. “Russo isn’t who he’s been pretending to be all these years.” Before you had the chance to say anything, Frank just gave you a look and you just listened to him explain what he meant.

That’s how you came to learn of the truth on the deaths of Maria and the kids and the attempted murder of your cousin. You learned about the reason behind all the killings that happened in Hells Kitchen with the gangs and in the prison. He told you everything he knew and did – like working with Micro, who had the something very similar happen to him, to take down the people who destroyed their lives, to chaining Daredevil to a roof because he was being annoying in trying to stop Frank when he was looking to ‘talk’ to the people at the carousel that day. _Which you obviously scolded him for doing, after laughing for a few minutes since you now knew who Is behind the Daredevil mask, because chaining people to a roof is never a nice thing to do but Francis Castle was never nice to most people._

He told you about him taking the guns right from underneath Homeland’s nose and then stopping to pull out the agent in charge after the crash happened. You were informed that Curt knew about Frankie being alive and he had to stop you from going to Curt’s place to punch him in the nose for keeping this from you. And then finally Frank told you how your fiancé, Billy Russo, was involved in all of this.

And you cried.

You just cried and cried in his arms for well over an hour because you were too overwhelmed with all the information and a part of you couldn’t believe that Bill could do something like that to his family – to _your_ family.

“He wouldn’t do that, Frankie. You’re wrong. Someone had to have gotten their information mixed up. Maybe Billy was another target on a list? What if it was meant to be only him that was supposed to be killed that day? You have to be wrong. You have to be.” You rambled on while tears still slid down your face.

Frank looked down at the floor and when he looked back up at you, he handed you a file that you did not even realize he had.

Through clenched teeth, he muttered, “I’m not wrong, princess. He was involved with my—with _our_ family dying. I was supposed to die with them and according to that,” he gestured to the file in your hands. “He was going to either give you to the person he answers to as payment for something or he was going to let them come to finish off the Castle bloodline by killing you.”

Sitting there you were shocked and just staring at the closed file in your hands. You couldn’t find the strength to open it and look through the papers and read what your cousin was telling you. Frank Castle was a lot of things, but he was never a liar, so you knew without a doubt that he was being 1000 percent honest with you about what he found.

“Princess, there is one more detail that might really hurt you. It’s part of why I’m here, right now. I came as soon as I saw what was in that file.”

Loosening your grip on the folder, you let it fall to the floor as you stare at Frank’s constantly moving trigger finger. You don’t notice his other hand has moved until he places two fingers under your chin and tilts it up to look him in the eye.

“What is it?” A defeated sigh leaves your lips, “Frankie, what could possibly hurt me more than the learning that my fiancé had a part in the killings of our family, tried to have you killed more than once and is now trying to figure out the best way to deal with me? What is worse than all that?” You cry out.

Frank wipes a few tears away and squeezes your right hand. “Whatever he’s planning on doing, it’s being set up to happen on a specific date that’s coming up soon.”

“A specific date? Am I supposed to know what the hell that means? The only day that we have plans set for that is coming up is—no. Frank, please don’t tell me it—”

“It’s the 17th of October.” He pauses and squeezes your hand again. “His plan is supposed to go into motion on that day.”

A tearful smile crosses your face. “I’m going to die on the day proposed to me on?” A bitter laugh escapes you before you can stop it. “At least you can say Billy is very fucking consistent.”

Your cousin grips the back of your neck, squeezing and leans his forehead against yours. “Hey. You listen to me, yeah?” He grits out. “Don’t ever let me hear you say repeat that shit. You aren’t going to die, kid. I’ll kill every single one of them a thousand times over before they even think to lay a finger on you again, understand? We still have a while to get a plan together to get you out of here and away from him. You trust me, yeah?”

Nodding, you whisper. “Yeah, cousin. I trust you.” He nods once back at you and stands up heading back into the kitchen. You can hear him opening cabinets and the coffee machine start making noises, so you stay in your spot and just let everything settle in your head. This is way too much to handle all at once, with finding out your last family member has been alive all this time and the truth of what happened with your family. Then on top of that, learning that your fiancé, Billy fucking Russo, has been involved in all the bad shit.

Plus, now, you don’t even really know if you fell in love with a façade, he was forced to put on to keep you close for whoever he answers to or if you fell in love with the real Billy. You don’t know which would be worse at this point but either way, you were going to end up heartbroken. Now it was just a matter of if any deaths will come of it and if so, who’s death will it be?

When Frank comes back with two cups of plain black coffee you give him a small but thankful smile and take one from him. As you blow to cool it down, you realize something that makes your heart stop for the second or third time that night.

“Frank, you’re wrong.”

He takes a drink of the still boiling coffee and simply raises an eyebrow at you. Which roughly translates to, _“I’m never wrong about anything but what are you talking about?”_

Noticing your hands start to shake a little bit, you set the coffee down on the table and place them under your thighs. “You said we had a while to get a plan together, you’re wrong.”

“I’m not wrong, kid. It’s probably just your nerves on edge because of everything you heard today.”

You shake your head vehemently. “Frankie, you’re wrong! It’s October 15th right now which means there is a little over a day for your plan to come together before Billy comes back to get me. He told me he had a client a couple hours away to tend to but he would be back by our anniversary to take me out.”

Standing up, Frank walks over to you, pulls you up from the couch and into the bearhug that always had a way of making you feel extremely safe. “That’s plenty of time, don’t worry about it, yeah? Just go pack a bag princess, you’re going to come stay with me and Micro until this is settled.” You wrap your arms around his waist and softly agree to get some of your things together and once you’re done he grabs his duffle bag and places the file back in it and pulls you outside to a not-as-creepy-as-a-white- van and takes a route to where you will be staying for the foreseeable future.

Being at the bunker is very strange. You’ve only been here for five hours and you don’t have anything to do but worry and stress over the possibility of you dying or of Frank getting himself killed trying to protect you. So, you decide the best thing to do, instead of worrying on how you and your cousin will eventually die, is to hover behind Micro. Who, you learned is actually a guy named David Lieberman, after being there for ten minutes. The only reason you figured that out was when your cousin yelled it out as loud as possible when Micro insisted that ‘Micro’ was honestly his legal name and that was the only thing you could call him. 

“You are always sucking the fun out everything, Castle. Stop being a fun-sucker.” David mumbles under his breath but loud enough you can still hear it and you let out a little snort, making him jump in his chair. “Jesus. You Castle’s are really trying to kill me, aren’t you? One with guns and the other is going to give be a damn heart attack.”

Trying and failing to stifle your laughter, you offer David some of your skittles as an apology and take a seat next to him. “I didn’t mean to scare you, Davey; I was just trying to see what you were doing and if it’s something I could learn.”

Micro raises an eyebrow at you. “You, princess of the Castle bloodline, want to learn how to do all,” he pauses to wave his hands towards all his computers, “this?”

You start to nod but that’s all you can do in reply before Frank walks over and shoves at David’s shoulder. “Shut it, Lieberman. Only I’m allowed to call her princess, yeah? And if I hear you call me a “fun-sucker” again I’m going to show you just how much fun I can be with all my new ‘toys’. Now, tell me what you have so far?”

David sends you a _he is so bossy_ look before he starts typing and clicking on things all over his computer screens. You see some pictures of Billy pop up and it makes you flinch a little. Frank immediately notices, rolls his chair next to yours and knocks his knee against yours in the typical Castle way of saying, _you’re not alone; I got you. Always._

Knocking your knee back in to his, you place your head on his shoulder and listen to David explain that Billy has been a 15-minute drive away from you for these past three weeks he’s been “working” and that he’s at some place that Frank had been before a few weeks ago. He goes on to show blueprints to three buildings and some notes, written in Billy’s writing, that are very detailed descriptions of ways to get away with lying to someone, who was trained by a marine to spot things or people out of place.

The one thing that stands out to you is the simple two sentences at the end of each description and those two sentences break your heart a little more each time you read them over again.

_“Target will be completely unarmed when taken. They trust me irrevocably, so they won’t question a thing as long as I’m there to keep them in their place.”_

You know there is going to be worse things than that as David keeps showing your cousin everything he’s found, so you decide to try and get some sleep. Standing, you lean down to give Lieberman a hug and thank him for letting you stay at his secret basement, man lair. Then you hug Frank and plant a kiss on his cheek before you go lay down on the little bed he set up for you. There isn’t a way out of this situation without one of the men you love with everything in you getting hurt.

You fall asleep quickly and sleep well into the next day; you honestly think you would have slept a lot longer if it wasn’t for your cousin getting mad at something Micro said or did and was currently threatening loudly to put a bullet in his leg.

Groaning loudly, you throw your arm over your eyes and murmur, “Frankie. Shut up and leave the poor guy alone. He’s had to live with you for however long it’s been and I know how that feels. Stop threatening him and just admit you have a soft spot for your little computer wizard.”

The only thing you hear after is David laughing as loud as he could and Frank grumbling as quietly as he could.

Just as you are on the edge of falling back by listening to the two men get along, you feel a body drop gracelessly down on the end of your little bed and is constantly moving. Finally peeking your eyes open, you see Micro wiggling in place where he dropped and Frank standing right behind him. Serious and grave looks glued to their facial features and you don’t have to be Einstein to know they have a plan but it’s not the best considering how short on time you are.

As you open your mouth to ask a question, David blurts out the ‘plan’.

Not saying anything, you stare at him until he finally repeats what he just blurted out.

“He has to take you.” David mumbles, quieter than before.

You glance back and forth between David and your cousin and wait for them to continue with the master plan.

“I don’t like it, but he’s right kid.” Frank continues. “Bill’s going to arrive at your place, where you will be dressed and waiting. You said he always takes you out to dinner for your engagement anniversary, right? Then that won’t change, let him do what he normally would, the only difference this time is we will be there watching out for you. You’re going to be safe the entire time, I promise you that.” He notices your hands are twitching where they lay in your lap and he places his on top. “It’s going to be okay, kid. I did some work while you were sleeping and now there is only one route he can take to get to your favorite restaurant but he has to drive by some empty warehouses to get there and I’ll be waiting for you in the third one, alright?”

Frozen in fear of what you realize is going to happen very soon, you nod your understanding of the plan and let it play out a few times in your head before you get up to get ready.

_It’s time to soldier up, princess._ You hear 15-year-old Frank’s words bounce around in your head as you finish the curling the last piece of your hair and put on your lipstick. _We’ve got a war to win._ These words come through next once you are in the car.

You look at the time on your phone and you try to get a handle on your nerves as you arrive to the condo you live at with Billy.

“You’ll be safe, Castle Junior. You know Frank will be in the third warehouse; he has the nails set in the road so the tires will go flat quick enough that Billy will have to stop right near the third warehouse, and Frank will handle everything else. I’ll be in the sky and everywhere else keeping an eye for his team.” Sending him a thankful smile for going over everything one last time you open the door and step out. Just as your about to close it, David calls for you again.

“Princess. When I say you need to go, please don’t ignore it. You may have met me for the first time yesterday, but it feels like I’ve known you as long as Frank has with all the stories he told me and neither of us can lose another person to these people.” You nod once and take a step back again, waiting to see if he says what you already know. When he doesn’t, you close the door and turn around to head into the building.

And that’s when you hear the motor of the window and his voice following you up the sidewalk.

“You may not get to say ‘goodbye’ to him, CJ. Don’t jeopardize your life to give him one.”

Not turning back to face the van, you tilt your head to the side to show you heard him. You wait there, unmoving, until you hear the van pull away before you take a shaky breath, steel your nerves once more and continue inside to what was once your home.

~~~~~~~

It is about two hours later when you are back on the road. You had dinner with your fiancé, talked about the future like you normally would, shared dessert, took pictures on your usual walk around the park. It was a normal anniversary celebration night. You were back in the SUV and on your way home when you realize you are nearing the stretch of road with all the warehouses. And a small part of you starts to feel the dread coming.

You frown at Billy when you notice he has his phone in his hand. “Hey, y’know it’s dangerous to text and drive, Bill? I wouldn’t want my fiancé to get arrested on our anniversary.” Billy chuckles and puts his phone back in his pocket. He pats your thigh twice before focusing back on the road.

Looking out the front windows you see the warehouses getting closer and your nerves spike. You start thinking about the worst-case scenarios and just as your about to call Micro, you see it. The smallest glint on the wall of one of the warehouses, that could be assumed to be made by the moonlight, but you knew better. 

And that is when you hear a pop and Billy lets out a curse. “Sorry, baby. It’s probably just one of the tires going flat. I’ll get it fixed though, you just stay in the car, okay?” Nodding your head, you wait until you hear the car door shut before you look closer at the building. Looking for something other than the small glint on the wall and sure enough, you notice a shadow standing on the roof of the building.

It is not noticeable unless you were really looking for something that doesn’t belong. The only reason you were able to see it was the glint, which was the drone hovering over the shadow.

You knew without a shadow of a doubt that Frank had his face painted, vest on, at least three weapons on him and one near the entrance of the building where you are supposed to head towards – he’s ready for a war.

And as nervous, heartbroken and confused as you feel – so are you.

Within the first minute of Billy getting the spare tire out of the back of the SUV, he makes a joke about how this is a perfect place for an ambush. You knew it was a joke that he didn’t want you to hear because there was absolutely no reason for either of you to be ambushed. But you can tell by his body language, he’s not sure if he should be worried or not. When you climb out of the car, you can see that he’s trying to laugh it off.

Billy looks at you, with a question on the tip of his tongue when you both hear a noise from inside the warehouse.

As Billy pulls out his phone, he looks over at you and yells, “baby, get back in the car now! Stay there and stay hidden until I come back for you!” You don’t move, just stare at him as he sends a couple messages out and when he realizes, he begins to yell again.

That is until Frank jumps down on the wooden crates right in front of the car and suddenly, all hell breaks loose.

You turn to run towards the entrance, where you knew Frank had hid the other gun and where you’d be safe, but the second Billy sees it’s Frank standing there all geared up, your fiancé immediately rushes to stand between you and his old best friend. It confuses you for a second and that split second is what causes your mind to spiral into the questions you avoided thinking about.

_Why is he protecting you now? Why was he involved with what happened to your family? How did he get involved in all this? Why didn’t he stop it? If he was scared why didn’t he tell Frank or you or anyone else? Why did he do it at all? Why did he propose when he knew that the Castle’s were the only family you had, and he took that all away – from both of you? Why is he doing this now? Why didn’t frank come to you sooner? Why you? Why is he trying to break the last few pieces of your heart by not owning up to his plan of handing you over to his boss or killing you? Why in the hell do you still love him knowing everything he’s done and plans to do?_

You don’t realize you were mumbling some of these questions until Billy turns around and faces you with a stunned look and an angry glint in his eyes. And now you are face to face with the man who has the blood of your family on his hands. The man who is trying to convince you everything your cousin has told you is a lie.

Billy is begging you to believe him. “ _Tesoro_. C’mon, please don’t tell me you actually believe him? He’s been lying to you for months about not actually being dead! How can you believe him that I was apart of what happened to your family?” When you don’t say anything he shakes his head and a long sigh escapes his lips. “Okay, I haven’t been completely honest about this but neither has he, baby. Your cousin knew about what happened to Maria and the kids because he helped set it up! He didn’t want to give up killing when we came back from our last tour. He got addicted to it and he knew they would hold him back from doing what he wanted. That’s the truth.”He HH

He grabs your left hand and runs his thumb over your engagement ring. “This, right here baby, should show you who is on your side.” Pulling your hand out of his, you feel a tear fall down your face as you take a step back. You see the moment Billy realizes he’s already lost you and that’s when he grabs your face and kisses you hard, trying to make a statement, trying to bring you back to him. Shoving him back you realize you’re full on crying and mumbling repeatedly, “ _why, why, why?”_

Your fiancé leans to grab you again and Frank finally gets Billy’s attention again. Frank hasn’t said a single word since this whole thing started playing out. The only thing he does is aim his gun right at Bill’s head the minute Billy starts whispering something to you in Italian. As your brain registers what he’s said, you start crying harder than before and stumble back against the car.

“You aren’t telling her the truth, Bill. Tell her what you did!” Frank spits out. “Tell her how you were going to give her over to Agent Orange once you got home! Yeah. I know about it all. I know everything that you’ve been doing and every pot you have your hands in. Tell the woman you love, the woman you proposed too, tell my baby cousin how you planned her death out, Russo!”

Billy starts shaking his head back and forth. Talking about things that don’t make sense and when he mentions the steak and ribs dinner he loves to have; you know what’s happening.

You sense, more than feel, Bill move to grab the gun from his belt before you drop the knife from your sleeve and hold it to his neck. “You’re stalling, _micio_ ,” you say hoarsely. “Please don’t do anything stupid and just do what Frankie says.”

Billy laughs, it’s one you’ve never heard before and you can see a darkness in his eyes that was never there before. “C’mon, _anima mia_ , put that down. You aren’t going to use it. You’ll only hurt yourself or if Frankie boy keeps aiming that gun at me, I could kill you with it before he gets one shot off.”

With a tearful laugh, you shake your head in slight disappointment. “Bill, please. Please just stop this. I-I- I will do this, you know that. You know I’ll hurt you if I have to because you are the one who trained me for this exact situation,” you murmured. “Granted, you swore it would probably be a random stranger or someone who wanted to go after you, so you made me train for weeks upon weeks until you thought I was good enough. I was your secret weapon, remember?”

Bill moves suddenly and you let the training he gave you kick in as you slice across his chest before you stab it into his shoulder. The way you moved gave Frank an opening and you heard the gun go off four times. You completely expected the shots to be in his chest but they there was one in each of his legs and two in his gut.

There was a lot of blood and Billy wasn’t moving. But neither were you. Frank was still giving him the chance to tell you the truth but it was like time had stopped.

You were staring at his shoulder. At the knife Frankie got you before he left to his last deployment, sticking out of your fiancé’s shoulder. You were numb. Nothing was really registering in your head, you still couldn’t believe Billy was part of this whole thing to begin with.

You didn’t realize you were still crying and you completely forgot you weren’t alone with your _slowly_ dying fiancé until you felt a hand softly touch your shoulder before your cousin turned you away from Billy’s body.

“I’m sorry this happened, princess. I didn’t want to get you involved in this,” He pulls you in to a hug and you grip onto his arms. “But you deserved to know, and I knew if our positions were switched you would have told me too.”

Frank’s phone went off and he answered it while you still clung to him. You weren’t really paying attention to his words because he shifted his stance and now you were again staring at Billy from over his shoulder. Only this time his eyes were open and it looked like he was trying to speak while reaching out for you.

Frank tightened his grip around you and kissed the side of your head. “C’mon kid, we gotta go, yeah? His back up is about seven minutes out.”

You nodded once and let Frankie start leading you away before something in you forced you to stop and run back to where Billy laid. Your cousin didn’t try to stop you, he knew this was the only closure you could get so he let you go. Dropping to your knees you grab Billy’s hand and lean your forehead against his. “I’m sorry,” you croak and squeeze your eyes shut and try to get your breathing under control. “ _Ti amo, più di ogni altra cosa, mio amore. Sempre_.”

You hear Frank’s phone ring again and his gruff voice calls out, “princess, I hate to do this but we gotta go now. That was a two-minute warning.”

You nod not caring if he is looking as you stare into Billy’s eyes for a second before you place one last kiss on his lips.

You get up and run to Frank’s side as he heads towards the exit. You turn your head as you get to the door and then your hand is in Frank’s as he pulls you along to the van where David was waiting. There was no other sound other than both of your footsteps on gravel and the lingering echo of the final words to your fiancé.

_“_ Maybe in another lifetime, goodbye my love.”

What you didn't hear as you ran towards safety was someone running through the building or Billy's reply as the person applied pressure to his wounds.

_"In every lifetime, I'm yours. I'll find you again in this one, my love, and I will get you back."_

**Author's Note:**

> this was written for the badthingshappenbingo. 
> 
> Hope you liked it!  
> Let me know what you think!  
> & thank you for reading! <3
> 
> you can also find me on tumblr at sunny-wolff :)


End file.
